TheHeroOfLight

Jess makes her debut with the objective of sinking the Black Hole navy. You have a couple weeks to get over to the battleships and start hitting them with indirect fire to take them down. While this is going on, you need to get a unit onto the little island to find the map and endure a never ending stream of air units that are coming from the airport. Make sure the indirects are guarded as you need them more than the directs...

This is one of the annoying missions as the place to repair Drake's stuff is so far away from the objective. What's worse is that unless you expose yourself to enemy fire, you will more often than not chip away at the enemy rather than flat out killing them. This makes it difficult to get a good power score, and I am suspecting you may be better off getting Kanbei to build a Lander and send someone over to destroy the cannons or at least leave the final blow for him so you can get better scoring.

The time has come for Yellow Comet to show Black Hole to the door. There are different ways this map can play out, such as not having Blue Moon's help if you did the Yellow Comet campaign first. Since the factory maps usually suck, I find it best to have Grit for them whenever he is available, the final one excepted. If you want a good power score, you need to get across the water with Grit very quickly to try to race over to the factory so you can blast some newly created units. Since they can move on the turn they spawn, you are more likely to get blasted, so I don't recommend this. Most likely, there will be a naval unit or two that you will sink over the entire map, and then a few ground units as you make your way to the seam. It is fairly easy to take a ranged shot to bring it down, which is the simple way to do this map. As for Kanbei, you don't get a good enough economy quickly enough and with all of the free units Adder gets, it is very difficult to get off the ground in a reasonable amount of time. Since Adder has air support and you do not, you don't even have the option of falling back on a bottleneck and relying on your partner to do anything either. You will win any straight up clash between you and him, so they try to give him advanced units to make it closer to an even match. With the garbage terrain between you and him and his mobility bonus, you can't really cut through that area in a decent amount of time.

And we kick things off with one of the missions that make Eagle endearing to his fans. There is a need to destroy an enemy fortress, but realizing the body count such a plan would create, Eagle hesitates. Rallied by his subordinates, he leads the strike. We have a fixed number of units here, and this is one of the fights that really highlights the difference in the AI between the original version and here. On GBA, Hawke would never hesitate to fire off his power, but here he will hold onto it unless he has troops that need healing. As a result, we make sure to wipe out the initial wave, get into position, and bring everything to a swift close with Eagle's super. Blowing up some of the defenders during the super makes sure I achieve the power goal and we bring this mission to a swift close and succeed in alleviating Eagle's greatest fear.

Unable to beat the Yellow Comet group conventionally, Adder resorts to a trick to try to assassinate them. Isolated from the rest of the group, Sensei steps up and drives the Black Hole back for the second to last time. The strategy here is that you need to get the air units from the south to clean out their area and then head to the northwest corner to win the map. You can secure properties with infantry as you go, but you will need to work on putting up a defensive line in the corner until the air support arrives. Indirects and infantry are really good for stalling, and there are ways to cheese this that I may be forced to do on a hard campaign (shoot to wound!). The main thing to worry about are the infantry that cross the mountains as they have a lot of cover and can walk around the bottlenecks.

We have reached the map that has left people questioning many things about the series ever since it was first encountered. Is this a real war or are we seeing kids play with toys? The characters do not behave consistently and seem to alternate between one and the other throughout the series, so we do not have a definite answer. As for the mission itself, it is very similar to Grit's intro mission. We have loads of indirect units stationed on the other side of mountains and we need to peek over them to take some shots and thin out the enemy herd before they can reach Sonja's HQ. We need to leave one unit parked on top of it, but we are able to hide the one rocket in the area in the trees to try to give us a last resort for the enemies who inevitably survive the barrage.

Since we found the map with Sonja earlier, we are able to take on the Neotank mission, which is one of the weirder ones. For one, this is the only lab mission where you have an ally, but said ally is a sitting duck and on harder difficulties, can get wiped out, costing you the mission. The strategy here is that Sami provides cover fire with the battleships to weaken some of the enemy units and then you use up the cruiser to shoot down an air unit or two. There is no way to repair or resupply, so you need to make your shots count. Sadly, her power can't do anything here. As for Kanbei, we need to capture the neutral properties and get a ground force out to seize the middle of the map. While that is going on, we need to develop an air force to destroy the naval units and make their way up to the top. Due to the winding path, the air units should arrive before the ground. Get in position so you can swoop in and take out the units that threaten you, then go for the rout for the win. When doing this on harder difficulties, cap may be better depending on what resistance you encountered.

We hit the mission that endears Kanbei to many of the fanbase. With his people in danger, Kanbei dashes through Adder's trap to save them. You need to time your movements through the lasers and chokepoints to get through without taking too much damage (destroying the lasers is an option). As long as you can break the bottlenecks before the infantry all get to the cities, you can remove the time limit and deal with him at your comfort (if you don't mind losing speed score).

Sensei steps up to the plate. We have a map with long, narrow strips of land, so it is best to attack from the air to ignore large swathes of the map. The air units will need ground cover from the anti-airs, so don't neglect the boots on the ground. Basically, you want to hop from start over to the peninsula, then you can attack him from two sides to get a swift resolution rather than wading through bottlenecks.

The time has come for Blue Moon to evict Black Hole. If you did Yellow Comet's campaign first, you can choose from their COs in addition to Orange Star, but since we didn't, it is time to unleash one of the greatest tag teams of all time: Max and Grit. I give Max the properties on the left side of the map so he can heal and create his own units while Grit takes the middle and right. We want to work our way up to the airport with him so we can take to the sky and have a backup plan to deal with the pipe seam. For Grit, you get to see the crawling zombie in action. Waves of infantry lead artillery and a pair of rockets into position and anything that pops out is immediately shredded. Once close enough, we can pop Grit's power to take out the seam from a distance. With this map coming to a close, we now head into Yellow Comet and get to see in more detail how the AI has changed...

The mission everyone usually waits for. You will find the Neotank map here in one of the southwestern cities, and it is very possible and easy to end the map by destroying all of the cannons before you even reach that city. Now, this map is significantly different from the GBA since Adder has to follow fog rules. You are able to trap him if he overextends, and he can't destroy your initial units as easily if you take a defensive stance around the starting cities. Just make sure you watch the factories and let him largely come to you. Once you crush his advancing force, he won't have any additional units created per turn unless he gets the port or factory. This means you just need to carefully advance against his cannons and the indirects guarding them. Once you get past the base in the middle of the map, you may activate his air units and have to deal with them. Still, at this point you should be able to create some powerful units and drive him back as long as you don't overextend.

To bring Throne's story to an end, we must go to where everything began, just in more ways than she anticipated. Using the keys she obtained, she is able to find the ruins of a city that serves as the birthing ground for the core of the Blacksnakes. As she makes her way through the remnants, she learns what the Blacksnakes are, and in meeting their true leader, there are a couple clues dropped about the bigger picture, but they may be more subtle than I realized. As for the boss fight, I can barely hold back anymore, and you can see that we shredded him immediately. It wasn't until he summoned his other pawn that we ran into a little difficulty and once we got through that, we finished the boss off. The good news is that I can't go completely crazy with power until we do Temenos's story. The bad news is that we are running out of other things to do first... As for the narrative, I had to take this one apart. I believe if you follow the Mother storyline, it actually does tell a decent tale. Throne is supposed to be cold and aloof, doing whatever it takes, and she gets demolished and does change her way of living. The suicide by drink is one of the things that shocks her as she was expecting things to play out differently and began to drive home the consequences of her actions. When Mother is killed in front of Mira, she doesn't kill Mira, but instead accepts the girl may one day look for revenge. Then when we fight Claude, we bring the whole nightmare to a close so that no one else has to suffer. Throne gets out of the underworld, and in doing so, she may have saved a lot of the others that were being bred and groomed for various roles with her. Therion may be a fan favorite, but from this angle alone, I think Throne does have the superior story. As for the father route, we get to see more about Throne's birth and upbringing, but it just doesn't fit into the narrative beyond the flashbacks it offers. He is more of an enabling force trapping her in the lifestyle she is currently in, and in order to get out, she must literally do it over his dead body. Sadly, that is the extent of what his character has to offer in the big picture, and he may have been okay for a single boss, but not for how they build him up. It does also make his first chapter where you have to wipe out the competition a little meaningless as it is the opposite direction of where Throne is going.

I don't really think there is anyone in Black Hole that could fight Kanbei on this map. The objective is to seize the middle island, and once you do, there just isn't a lot that Flak can do anymore. He will squander his missiles early, and you can use yours to break the bottleneck, or if you line up your units correctly, you can just smash through them with sheer force. A very easy map, but Kanbei is simple enough to not really require an introduction like this.

The gloves come off. As my levels are quickly spiraling out of control, I opt to tackle the hardest dungeon of the game and plan to take on the 3rd strongest boss while I am still close to its level. However, due to bad luck the boss accidentally unleashes Temenos's true power, and you can see why he is the strongest magic user in the game. Sadly, this is still with me holding back some as there are ways to go even higher than you see here. Perhaps the cameo from the previous game deserved a little better...

In Gravell, we discovered the boy with the cursed teddy bear, but I couldn't figure out what we were supposed to do. After putting way too much effort into this, we find the boy at sunrise outside town and the only person who can interact with him is Temenos, for a special battle. Usually we are conducting an inquisition, but today, we are performing an exorcism... The reward for this is a staff that serves as the ultimate weapon for an Arcanist, boosting both light and dark. It can serve as a decent weapon for Temenos by boosting his light spells, but I prefer to give him something else.

Bring someone who can Guide when you come here. We are searching for some missing girls, and upon getting to the bottom of the ravine, we are greeted by the Octopath equivalent of Cthulhu. Upon beating him, we are able to save one of the sisters and by bringing her home, we bring this side quest to a close.

This map is a little more difficult on account of the changed AI. Before, they were very easy to predict, but here they make some different moves. Luckily, Grit is still the best marksman around and we can shred anything we come across. If we can wipe out all of the enemy infantry, we can take our time in making our approach. You do have the option of ignoring the cannons entirely, or you could dedicate a unit to sniping them, your call. Just make sure you get to the HQ in time.

Here we reach one of the best stories available in the game. I wasn't expecting as much out of Castti, and it may look a little familiar if you played the original and remember Alfyn's story. Sadly, I think that overlap with Alfyn is the main thing that holds this one back. We arrive at Timberain for a coronation and need to warn the people. Getting some help from all of the people we've helped on the way, we reach Trousseau as he launches his attack. This fight is the tipping point to where I can't really hide my power anymore as you can see he can only survive a few rounds. I hold back on some of my stronger stuff, but you have to race here as you are losing max HP and I don't know if there is a way to restore it. Narratively, this is one of the better ones as Castti does gradually recover her memory and make connections as she goes. She gets the usual healer dilemmas as she goes, so those aren't things we haven't seen before. The overall time frame on hers is a little hard to pin down as it seems like she has the smallest window from where her story begins and ends. Ultimately, all of her chapters have meaning, and she contributes a lot more to her own story than a lot of the other characters do to theirs. If her ending were not a retread of the previous game, I think I could rate her story as the best of the bunch. The important part about completing this chapter is it will unlock a lot of content from her supporting cast. You will be able to find one of the best knives in the game, which is helpful as I am lacking in that department and the knife is probably the most common weapon, possibly tying with the sword. There is a decent accessory up for grabs too, so if not for the boss fight here being a little dangerous if you can't blitz him, this may be a good final chapter to start with before tackling the others.

Welcome to one of my most hated maps/missions in the entire series. Originally, I never bothered playing around with this map on the GBA, to see if there were any exploits you could use to make it out of here any easier. With the AI changes in the Switch version, it may be possible to come up with something, but I just don't have any desire to find it. This is a map where you need to survive for a couple weeks, and Colin is horribly outgunned. It is worse on Advanced. We have a small bottleneck we can try to plug with troops, but we do not have the economy to get any big units out (at all) to slow her down. Ultimately, I end up just spamming infantry that she has trouble clearing out and we manage to complete the map. The rating on this one is pretty bad, which is why I recommend skipping this mission in the original game where there are unlocks for having a good average score.

This is a mission that can give people a little bit of trouble as the time limit is a little tough. The main takeaway from this is that you can see why I never go out of my way to play Olaf, and to demonstrate how bad he is in co-op. We need to secure the eight properties in the middle of the map that are guarded by indirects and a slew of other units. Andy is here to help, but he only has air units and no way to repair them. The APC is a must in order to keep them fueled and supplied. The Olaf strategy is that we must open the top pipe seam to get the infantry in so they can cap, and that is where the best reinforcements come from. You can completely abandon the bottom if you want, but in order to preserve our technique score, I aim to save them. We need to use our heavy units to smash the indirects in the middle of the map and drop a Winter's Fury to slow his advance and chip all of his units. Just make sure you do not leave Andy high and dry as the snow slows him down even if he is in the air...

This is coming out late due to an emergency, but now we can make our way to Timberain and pass one of the optional dungeons that I will be doing last. If you're wondering, the disappearing girl marks a diary explaining what happened at the mansion, but you can't do that side quest until we get to Merry Hills, so it will be a little while before we get here. Otherwise, we make the trek to Timberain and endure the slog of random encounters in the process. There isn't really too much going on, and sadly, most of the chests we find don't have much to offer since we are in the final stretch of the game. I pretty much have all of the consumables I will ever need, I have more money than I can reasonably use outside of the super boss, and some of my characters have their ultimate weapons. So everything we do here is just stuff for completion's sake unless it involves one of the few missing pieces of special gear, which I will make efforts to denote.

This is coming out a little late since it stopped uploading overnight. We are tackling the Neotank mission here and there are a few different ways to do this on normal mode. For time and convenience, I opt to use the Advanced strategy, so what I do here can almost be done 1:1 on the harder difficulty. Basically, you want Colin here to get higher tiered units out sooner than Lash can and you want to missile the stuff at the lab to weaken it. Then your units rush in there to wipe them out and an APC/TCopter will drop off an infantry for the cap while your units wall off the reinforcements. Not too complicated.

We return to the high seas one more time to get the rest of the business here out of the way. This means we will get the EXP boosting item, get the spare parts from the lighthouse for the side quest on land, and find any other pieces of loot that are to be had. This does include returning to Osvald's prison and looting the new NPCs there, but that very much is an optional area unless you're achievement hunting, and I would not recommend making the trip at all.

This is a very short dungeon that yields an accessory to boost JP gain. If someone has fallen behind or you desperately want the Conjurer boost for skills, it can help bring someone up to speed. Other than this, there is no boss to be encountered and no pieces of ultimate gear, so it is up to you if it is even worth the trip.

Osvald's conclusion has arrived as the golden thumbnail may reveal. He confronts Harvey in search of the one True Magic and to reclaim his daughter. Narratively, this one falls a bit in the middle of the pack for me as it has a very open ending and seems to serve more as setting up the final boss than providing much closure to his tale. It is not nearly as one dimensional as Ochette's, which seems to consistently hold last place. The problems I have here is that Osvald fails to achieve anything beyond the One True Magic. He is unable to reclaim his family, is unable to clear his name (remember that he is not a fugitive since he is believed dead), and while he holds the magic he sought, he doesn't do anything. It is implied that he wishes to continue researching the magic (whether he believes the violet stuff is up for debate), but it kind of defeats the family angle of his revenge motivation. It would have been interesting if we could have gotten tragic story about the costs of obsession where he could only use the magic after literally losing everything, but we get this wishy-washy half ending. Sadly, compared to the original game, I'd say both Scholar stories are lackluster. Cyrus was probably the weakest of the bunch despite having an interesting hook of being falsely accused of a crime he did not commit (deja vu?) and going out to clear his name. Osvald fails to live up to the second half of this premise, instead just dropping out when he has the magic. Sadly, with the bar so low, this is still somewhat in the middle of the pack...